


if you and I could exist in the spaces between

by jujubiest



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angelic Trueform, Cuddling, Dean Winchester's 100 percent canonical tentacle kink, M/M, established Destiel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-10
Updated: 2021-01-10
Packaged: 2021-03-14 15:21:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 851
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28672902
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jujubiest/pseuds/jujubiest
Summary: As far as Castiel can tell, Dean loves a man with Jimmy Novak’s face and voice and Castiel’s heart and grace and memories. On most days, he tells himself it doesn’t matter that Dean can’t perceive him fully, but there are other days when he wonders what Dean would think of his true form.
Relationships: Castiel/Dean Winchester
Comments: 5
Kudos: 76





	if you and I could exist in the spaces between

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this for whats-bi-is-dean on tumblr, in response to the recent tentacle lover Dean discourse, speculation on whether Castiel's true form has tentacles, and their brilliant comment on one of my posts about Cas finding out Dean is into tentacles and feeling pretty. I don't know what's happening in this fandom anymore, but I like it a lot.

Castiel has spent much of his existence feeling like he was between states. Neither here nor there nor yet quite finished. Liminal angel. That feeling only intensified when he began walking among human beings.

Never does he feel it so intensely as when Dean touches him, smiles at him, kisses him, holds him. He is both present and not present, known and unknown. As far as Castiel can tell, Dean loves a man, a man with Jimmy Novak’s face and voice and Castiel’s heart and grace and memories. On most days, he tells himself this is enough. That it doesn’t matter that Dean can’t perceive him fully, that it wouldn’t make any difference anyway. On most days, he believes that.

But there are other days--dark moments--when he wonders. Would Dean love him the same, if he could see his true form? Would he still open his arms and welcome whatever small part of Castiel he could wrap them around? Would he let himself be lifted up and held? Or would they be sudden strangers, unknowable to each other? Would he look into Dean’s green eyes and see fear there? Loathing? Disgust?

It’s a pointless question, it holds no meaning for their day-to-day life. But that doesn’t mean Castiel doesn’t wonder.

They’re curled up in bed together, Dean’s head on Castiel’s chest. It’s Castiel’s favorite time of day, minutes before they sleep. Sometimes they talk. Sometimes they don’t. But they always hold each other in the darkness, Dean’s fingers tracing idle patterns into Castiel’s ribs, Castiel’s fingers carding through Dean’s hair.

Tonight, Dean breaks the silence with a question.

“Y’know...I never thought to ask. What do you look like, when you’re not...this?” he pats Castiel’s side to indicate his human vessel.

Castiel’s hands still for a moment in Dean’s hair, and he’s quiet as he searches for the words to adequately describe himself. It’s made more difficult by the fact that he hasn’t ever actually perceived himself in that form. It isn’t as if angels have a use for mirrors or self-portraits.

“I...suppose to you I would look most like...like a being of celestial energy with many limbs and many wings and many eyes. Like a flying octopus made of holy light.” He chuckles. “My limbs--I suppose you could call them tentacles--are all colors, even a few your eyes can’t see, so to you they would appear like bright white light. My wings are...are like voids in space and time, so to you I suppose they would appear black. My eyes are...well. I don’t actually know what color my eyes are. I’ve never seen my own eyes in that form.”

He falls silent then, and registers, with a sinking feeling in his stomach, that Dean has gone very still under his hands.

“Dean?” He says, sounding worried. Dean shakes himself a little, as though snapping out of a trance.

“That sounds...” Dean’s voice sounds oddly strangled. He clears his throat. “Uh...that sounds incredible, Cas.” But his voice still doesn’t sound quite right. Castiel shifts under him, slides gently down and away until they’re lying facing each other. Dean avoids his eyes, which makes Castiel feel cold all over, but when he reaches out a hand Dean leans into his touch without hesitation.

“I’m sorry if that description was more than you wanted to hear,” Castiel says, unable to quite keep the distress out of his voice completely. “I know it sounds...frightening. But Dean, you will never have to see me in that form. I promise.” It cracks his heart in two to say so, but if that’s what Dean needs...

But Dean is reaching out with both hands to pull him closer.

“Jesus, Cas, no! It’s not...not that _at all._ God, I _wish_ I could see that side of you. I wish I could _touch_ that part of you, I want...” he trails off, his voice sounding once again as if it’s been strangled out of him. He looks at Castiel helplessly, willing him to understand the things he can’t quite say out loud. _Praying_ them at him.

 _I want all of you, wings and eyes and however many limbs you have, too. I know we can’t but if we could, if I could see, touch you in that form, I’d_...and here even his thoughts fail him, and all Castiel gets is a swirl of images that make his breath catch in his throat: Dean, ecstatic, wrapped in tendrils of light.

He looks at Dean with wide eyes. There’s a helpless yearning there that he feels reflected in his own, and something in Castiel’s chest soars with happiness. He reaches back toward Dean, pulling him in for a kiss that is full of his love and their shared longing.

He can’t show Dean his true form. There is no way that wouldn’t risk Dean’s life, and Castiel would die before doing that. But knowing that Dean not only still loves him, but, somehow, _desires_ him in that form? It’s more than he had ever hoped for or imagined.


End file.
